The Day Pooh Discovered His Brain
by ZEKI FOR LIFE
Summary: This is a fic I wrote as an assignment for my Psychology elective.


**This is just a little thing I wrote for my Psychology elective, nya. Please enjoy!**

One sunny morning in the middle of July as Pooh was walking on by, Rabbit stuck his head out of his rabbit hole.

"Oh, Pooh, could you help me with my garden? The carrots and blueberries need to be harvested today, and at the end I'll give you some honey." Rabbit said.

"Honey?! Okay I'll help." Pooh cried happily.

And so, Pooh went around the fence to Rabbit's front door, following the grouchy yellow bunny to his garden and got to work.

"No, no, no not like that, you need to be more gently when plucking the berries of the bush, you can't just rip at the plant! You fluff brain." Rabbit shouted at the bear.

It was true Pooh was a bear of little brains, but it still hurt his feelings that his friend would call him that. Gloomily Pooh left Rabbit's garden and went to Owl's treehouse to ask the feathered sage a few questions on how he could discover his brain.

"Owl, can I come in?" Pooh asked hesitantly.

"Hoo hoo hoo's there?" the great bird sounded as though he'd woken from a nap. There was a fluttering inside the house before the door opened and he let Pooh in.

"What is it you need, Pooh?" the bird asked.

"I was wondering if you could help me discover my brain. I thought you were probably the best person to go to because Tigger can be a bit rowdy at times and Eeyore was busy being sad in his little hut and I didn't want to bother him."

"Alright I'll help. First, what do you know about the brain Pooh?" Owl questioned, seeing how much he would need to teach.

"Um, I know that I don't have one?" Pooh's reply was more a question than an answer.

"Not exactly, Pooh, everyone has a brain, even you." Owl replied sympathetically, "you just need to learn about it, so you know how to use it.

"Alright so the convolutions are the folds in the brain, it looks a bit like a walnut."

Pooh nodded slowly, starting to understand a little.

"Next up is the Left Hemisphere, it is located on the left side of your head it regulates language, logic and sequential tasks."

Pooh raised his paw, "what does sequential mean?"

"It means things that are in order of how they happen. Alright now the Temporal Lobe, it interprets auditory information. In other words, it makes sense of the things you hear, so that way when you hear something it doesn't sound watyzakjcka moooooooooooonnnnnajnlefikjae, do you understand so far?"

Pooh nodded again and giggled a little, finding the sound Owl had made extremely funny.

"The Occipital Lobe interprets visual information, making it to where you can see, and things aren't dark or fuzzy. The Parietal Lobe makes it to where you can feel things like pressure, pain temperature and touch."

Pooh reached across the table and stuck his paw in a honey jaw, continuing to listen to the wise bird.

"The Thalamus is a relay station for all the visual (vision), auditory (hearing) and somatosensory (pressure, pain and temperature) information."

Pooh looked intrigued but mildly confused, willing the bird to continue.

"Next is the Hippocampus and before you even ask, no it has nothing to do with Hippos. The Hippocampus is where all of your short term memories are taken to the place in your brain that store your long term memories." Owl looked up at his yellowy-orange companion to see if he was still listening, and, when he was satisfied that Pooh was, continued, "Hypothalamus is the part that controls you hunger, thirst and things like that. Why do think this particular part of the brain is useful?"

Pooh looked up startled by the pop quiz but smiled when he answered, "because if we didn't have it, we'd always be hunger or thirsty and that wouldn't be good because we would get sick?"

Owl nodded and patted Pooh on the head with his wing, "right, now the Right Hemisphere is responsible for facial recognition, meaning it's the reason you are able to recognize Rabbit, Piglet, Tigger, Eeyore, and Christopher Robin for who they are just by looking at their face, and it's also responsible for creativity."

"Please don't bring up Rabbit's name for a while, I'm very upset with him at the moment because he called me a mean name." Pooh looked sad at the memory.

"And the Amygdala is the part that has emotions and emotion laden memories, which you seem to be experiencing right now, later you need to go see Rabbit and tell him how you feel, it isn't good to keep your emotions all bottled up." Owl patted Pooh's head sympathetically, "the Frontal Lobe is responsible for speaking, future thoughts, and planning. I don't think I need to elaborate on that one, do I Pooh?" Pooh shook his head and bid Owl to continue, "Corpus Callosum, think of it as a really big, stable paper clip that connects the Left and Right Hemispheres of the brain together." Pooh imagined it and nodded slowly, understanding what Owl was trying hard to explain to him.

"Brain Stems control messages between your brain and the rest of your body. The also control basic functions of your body like breathing and swallowing. Do you understand about the brain now, Pooh?" the little bear nodded, thanked his feathered friend, and was on his way back to Rabbit's house.

On the way there, Pooh was pounced on by a familiar tiger.

"Whatcha up to Pooh?" Tigger asked, unable to hold still, he bounced on his tail beside the little bear.

"I was just about to go over to Rabbit's to tell him that I don't like it when he calls me 'a bear of little brains' because it hurts my feelings. Also, I need to help him finished harvesting things for his garden." Pooh replied.

"I'll join you then." Tigger said, smiling as he bounded beside Pooh.

They entered the grouchy yellow rabbit's garden to see him bent over his carrots, looking frustrated because there was not an even number of them and they weren't perfectly straight.

"Rabbit?" Pooh started, getting only an annoyed 'hm' out of the other, Tigger patted Pooh's back encouragingly, "Rabbit, I don't like when you call me a bear of little brains, because it hurts my feelings."

Rabbit finally looked up, guilty looking, "I'm sorry Pooh, it's just I'm very particular about my plants. Forgive me?" Pooh nodded and hugged his friend, Tigger was bounding off in the background, knocking over Eeyore's little hut.

And that is how Winnie the Pooh was no longer known as a bear of little brains, but instead he became the smartest bear in all of the Hundred Acre Woods.


End file.
